Reflexion on Selin, Marie, Maïlys and Théo's story

This group has used drawings for their story, and they are really well done. They recorded their voices with VoiceThread but in the first two slides the voice is not very clear and we don't understand all the words but it gets better after even if we can hear sounds around. Maybe they could have made the slides go faster but the last three slides the speed at which they change alter.
They used music at the end of the which is a very good point but it doesn't really fit the story.
Their intonation is very could except for the boy's voice because it's hard to understand the words.
In their activities, the grid exercise with the word across is a nice activity because it enables the students to learn how to write the words and to associate them with their pronunciation but we noticed that the word "ski" that they must  find is not linked to the story moreover the fact that the snow is white is not explicitly said in the story. Another little thing is that the word "bear" for the definition doesn't seem really appropriate for me, even if it is a good idea because it is full of imagery, but a bear is not a panda so maybe they could have say 'It is a little black and white animal".
We also notices, for a grammatical point, only one main mistake, when they say "the bears DOESN'T like" while it should be "the bears DON'T".
Moreover, we found that this story has a very good headline and that the moral is very well found because it is an interessant subject to introduce to the children and it is important to make them think about this theme of difference and tolerance and to make them aware of the fact that we should not reject any one.

Week 8- by Lucy

We presented our story to the rest of the class, today.

It was very interesting to find out what the other groups had to say about the work which we had done together.  

Some of the advice that was given to us was that I should use more intonation in my voice when I narrate, because, as it is, it will not engage the students.  I have just listened to our story again, and I agree with this comment.  

Another piece of advice that was given to the group was to use different voices in our story.  

This lesson was very interesting for me, being the only student native speaker in the class, it allowed me to listen to all of the other stories and give feedback, from a native speaker's point of view.  My feedback consisted mostly of remarks about pronunciation, intonation and a few grammatical mistakes.  

As a group we have decided to meet again on Friday to re record our story.  This time, we shall make a few changes.  I will still do the narration, but this time, Chloe will introduce the storybook, Lea shall do the voice of Emma's mother and Charline shall do the voice of Emma.  

Week 7- by Lucy

Today we divided our work up and gave each person a job to be completed by the following week.  My job is to draw the pictures.  We have also decided that we shall meet up in the library on Friday to put all of the pictures onto the computer so that Chloe can then colour them.  We will then do the voice recording of our story.  Lea knows how to use the program we are going to use to do this, so she shall take charge of that.  I will do the narration of the story.         

Week 6- by Lucy

Today was the day we learnt all about GIMP.  It was really interesting to learn about and listen to the lady speak.  I did not, however, fully comprehend all of what she had said, and so, I found the program very difficult to get my head around.  The girls, on the other hand, seemed to understand the program.  

The week commencing the 25th February

This week, I went back to England and I decided to expand on the basic outline which we had written together, combine it with the other ideas that we had thought of and wrote the story.  

I forgot to state in my last post, that we, as a group, had collectively thought that the moral of the story shoud be that, when you're in the hot sun, you should always wear sun tan cream.

Week 4- by Lucy

Week 4

A - Language improvement: vocabulary learnt, some part of grammar better understood, which type(s) of language difficulties are you facing, how a team-mate has helped in making you understand something?

The girls had trouble pronouncing a few of the words that were used in the basic outline of our story.  An example of this is the word ‘armbands’.  Originally, the girls pronounced it with the intonation rising on the second syllable, which is typically American.  I corrected their pronunciation, telling them that the stress is on the first syllable, causing the intonation to go down on the second, so to make the pronunciation sound more British. 

 B - Pedagogy: Which type of decision-taking is important? Why do you take the decisions you do while making stories? Which aspect of teaching did you learn today?

We learnt to write the skeleton of the story, meaning the outline of the story.  This should be kept apparent throughout the story. 

C - Use of technology: how do you think the technology you are learning to use is helping you to make stories? Which types of technological difficulties are you facing? Are your friends helping? In what way?

We did not use a lot of technology throughout the course of this lesson, because we were just brainstorming ideas of what to include in the outline of the study.  Our main form of technology used during this lesson was ‘Audacity’. 

D - Collaboration: how are you dividing your tasks each week? Who does what? Who helps whom? Are you facing difficulties collaborating with each other? How are you sorting them out? How much work are you managing to do in class and how much do you do at home?

  

We did not divide our tasks throughout this lesson, because we were just brainstorming and therefore doing a lot of talking.  This was a good way of working together, however, because it allowed me to correct the girls’ pronunciation when needed and help them with any vocabulary questions that they had. 

  

Week 2- by Lucy

Each week, after class, I wrote notes about what I would like to put in the blog.  Now that I have been signed up to the blog, here are the notes that I wrote out.

A - Language improvement: vocabulary learnt, some part of grammar better understood, which type(s) of language difficulties are you facing, how a team-mate has helped in making you understand something?

Based on the fact that I am a native speaker, I haven’t improved my language skills in any way, however, I was able to offer advice on word pronunciation and explaining certain words. 

B - Pedagogy: Which type of decision-taking is important? Why do you take the decisions you do while making stories? Which aspect of teaching did you learn today?

For me, it is important that each member of the group contributes to the decision making.  I feel it is vital that every one of us has a strong input into what we would like our story to be about.  In our group, I feel we all made equal contributions when making decisions about our story. 

C - Use of technology: how do you think the technology you are learning to use is helping you to make stories? Which types of technological difficulties are you facing? Are your friends helping? In what  way?

The technology which we have learnt to use so far has been very helpful in the initial creation stage of our project.  I, however, find technology very confusing to get my head around, but the girls have been very helpful in teaching me how to use all of the technology we have seen so far!

D - Collaboration: how are you dividing your tasks each week? Who does what? Who helps whom? Are you facing difficulties collaborating with each other? How are you sorting them out? How much work are you managing to do in class and how much do you do at home?

  

As of yet, we haven’t really decided who will do what, in terms of dividing up the work and I feel that we really do need to start talking outside of class a bit more.